Historical Society

The On to Ottawa Historical Society

50th Anniversary

The story of the On To Ottawa Trek was revived on its 50th anniversary in 1985 by a joint committee of Vancouver trade unionists and Trek survivors.

On April 23 a gathering was held on Victory Square to mark the anniversary of the reading of the Riot Act by mayor Gerry McGeer. This time Alderman Harry Rankin read a proclamation of good will to the unemployed from Mayor Mike Harcourt.

On June 1 a banquet honouring the Trekkers was held at the Ukrainian Hall which was one of the halls that housed the Trekkers during their 1935 general strike.

On June 5th a delegation of Trekkers and trade union leaders left for Ottawa to complete the Trek stopped in Regina in 1935. In Calgary they had lunch with mayor Ralph Klein. In Regina they attended a public display of Trek momorabelia. In Ottawa they set up a soup kitchen on the lawn of the Parliament Buildings, met with the caucuses of the Liberal Party and New Democratic Party, formerly the Cooperative Commonwealth Federation, and had an audience with Prime Minister Brian Mulroney.

The On to Ottawa Historical Society

In 1986 surviving Trekkers and supporters established the [email protected] which arranged daily live performances at Expo 86. Leading figures in the Historical Society included Jean Sheils, the daughter of Arthur Evans, Robert Jackson, Frank Kennedy and Tom Hawken.

The Society, in cooperation with the Women's Labour History Project and Sara Diamond, in 1992 produced a video about the Trek titled On To Ottawa.

In the decade that followed its organization the Trekkers' Historical Society's show went to many towns and cities across Canada. As well the show was featured at labour conventions, universities and student union conferences. The Trek once more became an attraction, this time for tens of thousands of today's generation.

"One of the main lessons to be learned from our Trek," said [email protected], who crossed Canada several times in recent years for the Trekkers, "is that if progressive reforms are to be achieved, the people concerned must engage in militant struggle in the workplace and in the community.

In today's world where big corporations control the media, and where the power of national governments is restricted by trade treaties serving those who control the global economy, putting all our hopes in elections every four years won't solve our problems. Unity and struggle on an every day basis is the only answer."

Robert "Doc" Savage, another Trek leader now in his eighties feels the same way.

"We've made a lot of gains since the Hungry Thirties, " he said, "but now governments under corporate pressure are trying to roll back all our advances. They want Canada to become another Third World country. They want to take us back to the Thirties.

"Are we going to let them do it? That's the key question facing us today."

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